Friday Faves: Song Lyrics

This week I'm listing five of my favorite song lyrics. These are just lyrics that struck a chord and stuck with me with various reasons. I guess it goes without saying these are also all songs I love.

Born To Run on Amazon

"Remember all the movies, Terry, we'd go see
Trying to learn how to walk like the heroes we thought we had to be"

Backstreets ~ Bruce Springsteen (Born to Run)

Yes I Am on Amazon

"There's something waiting out there
That says I've got to try
I've been talking to my angel
And he said that it's alright"


Talking To My Angel ~ Melissa Etheridge (Yes I Am)

  

The Joshua Tree on Amazon

"I'll show you a place
high on a desert plain
Where the streets have no name"

Where The Streets Have No Name ~ U2 (The Joshua Tree)

Where You Live on Amazon

"If everything you think you know
Makes your life unbearable
Would you change?"

Change ~ Tracy Chapman (Where You Live)

Planet Waves on Amazon

"May you build a ladder to the stars
And climb on every rung
May you stay forever young"

Forever Young ~ Bob Dylan (Planet Waves)







Are there any song lyrics that are particularly meaningful to you or that simply hold a special place in your heart? I have a life-long love affair with music so I could probably have gone on all day with this list. It was hard to stop at five. :)

It's been kind of a crazy week here getting ready for the start of the new school year where I work so that is it for me today. Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Music Monday: Concerts

I think everyone who loves music can agree there's nothing like going to a great concert. No matter what type of music you enjoy, seeing and hearing it played live is an experience like no other. Most of the time that is a good thing but, as with anything else, there are exceptions. As fun as a great concert can be, a bad concert is a hellish way to spend a few hours.

I was listening to my Ipod while out walking with Clancy over the weekend and started thinking about some of the many concerts I've gone to over the years. It wasn't hard for me to immediately name the best and worst shows I've ever seen.

The Best:

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Born in the USA tour, 1984

I've been a Springsteen fan since I was a little girl and my brother started listening to Greetings from Asbury Park at our house. I saw him live for the first time when I was 15, right at the start of the Born in the USA tour in the summer of 1984. The concert lasted several hours, and I loved every second of it. It was the first concert I ever went to and, after starting with the Boss, it's been hard for anything else to measure up. I've seen Springsteen numerous times since and loved the shows, but there's been nothing to top the magic of that long ago night.

The Worst:

The Spin Doctors, Pocket Full of Kryptonite tour, 1992

If you listened to radio in the early 90s, it's a safe bet that you heard Two Princes by the Spin Doctors. It was a catchy song and my friends and I would walk around singing it all the time. We must have really loved it, because a group of us decided to go see the band when they came to Columbus, Ohio. By the time the concert ended, I never wanted to hear Two Princes or anything else from the Spin Doctors ever again. The whole show was nothing but disjointed noise and I was dying for it to end almost as soon as it started. To my knowledge the band never had another hit album, which was definitely no surprise to me after sitting through that concert.

The One The Got Away:

U2, Zoo TV tour, 1992

I've loved U2 since I was a young teenager in the 80s, but I never saw them in concert until 2005. I had an opportunity to see them in 1992 during their tour to promote Achtung Baby, which I think is their best album, but I didn't take it. I'm glad I finally saw the band live, but I'll always regret not seeing them when they were at their creative peak.

What about you? What's the best concert you've ever seen? Any you'd rather forget? Are there any shows you regret not attending?

Also, I'm really excited to be a guest at The Writing Nut later this week. I'll be hanging out with the wonderful Nutschell on Wednesday for her Wednesday Writer's Workspace series. If you're not already familiar with The Writing Nut, I highly recommend it. Nutschell has a fantastic blog. :)

U is for U2

I love music, and U2 has been one of my favorite bands for what feels like forever. U was another tough letter for me, (although most of the letters in the second half of the alphabet seem to be!) but when I thought about it, U2 seemed like a perfect choice.

I first started paying attention to U2 in the early 80s, around the time of the War album. A band from Ireland was practically unheard of in the US at that time, and it seemed very exotic to me. I loved the militant drumming of Sunday Bloody Sunday, and the song itself was impossible to ignore. I wanted to hear more.

When I came upon this video on youtube some time ago, it felt like a time warp. I remembered being an excited adolescent, watching MTV (at my friend's house as my parents didn't have cable at the time) and wishing I was there in the rain at Red Rocks.

As the 80s progressed, I started working at Arby's, my first job. I worked the late shift one summer, and closed down the restaurant each night. The Joshua Tree was the most popular album in the country at the time, and I remember playing the cassette on a boombox after we had locked the doors. We'd sing along to With or Without You while we washed mountains of dishes and cleaned dirty floors and tables.

When I finally got my first cd player stereo in the early 90s, U2's Achtung Baby was the first cd I ever bought. I still have the cd, and it remains one of my favorites.

The 90s went on, and I got distracted by too many other things to pay as much attention to music. I lost interest. But in the early 2000s, I watched U2's 2001 concert at Slane Castle in Ireland, and I became a fan all over again. The band was a lot older, and so was I. On some level, it felt like we'd grown older together.

When I watch this performance of what is probably my all-time favorite song, I almost feel as if I am there too, under the stars in Ireland, next to a centuries-old castle.

I think what I love most about music is that it can provide an escape from the doldrums and routines of every day life. When I listen to music, for a few minutes or a few hours, I can be transported to another time or place. A time when the world seemed much simpler, and responsibilities were few. A place where I may never have actually been.

Or, in some cases, a magical place that exists only in my mind.

I'll show you a place

High on a desert plain

Where the streets have no name ~ U2